Bridging equipment

[Flyboy]

This is probably a flight of fantasy, but have the developers ever considered adding bridging equipment to SPWAW/SPMBT?

I'm picturing a "bridge layer" truck that could be parked on the bank of a narrow river (say, 100 yards/2 hexes max), and if left unsurpressed and unmoved for a number of turns (maybe two turns per hex to be bridged, which could be sped up by the presence of engineers) would lay down a temporary bridge . . . ?

Thoughts?

[BruceAZ]

Great idea!! It has come up before and I forget why it could not be done. Something with the hardcode?

Recon
Semper Fi

[john g]

ORIGINAL: Flyboy

This is probably a flight of fantasy, but have the developers ever considered adding bridging equipment to SPWAW/SPMBT?

I'm picturing a "bridge layer" truck that could be parked on the bank of a narrow river (say, 100 yards/2 hexes max), and if left unsurpressed and unmoved for a number of turns (maybe two turns per hex to be bridged, which could be sped up by the presence of engineers) would lay down a temporary bridge . . . ?
Thoughts?

It is wrong for spwaw, as I recall this is one of the projects my father worked on in the early 1960's while transitioning from armor to the corps of engineers. Fast bridge layers are a modern invention. During WWII it took upwards of 24 hours to lay a bridge over a small body of water. Nothing in WWII could lay a bridge in the course of a scenario.
thanks, John.

[MOTHER]

what about those special engineering vehicles the brits used on d day.i recall a "path layer" and and bridging unit as part of the AVRE CLASS.
Are they in the game or has it been contemplated?,just cant remember.
Old age ,gets you every time.

[mckenzie]

I also recall those British "bridge-tanks", but I think they couldn't span an entire hex in SPWAW... they were more like for crossing narrow ditches.

[Belisarius]

Also, even if they were designed for "fast" ditch spanning, it still took a good 2 hours to deploy it, and that's not within the SPWaW time-frame.

[Losqualo]

ORIGINAL: Belisarius

Also, even if they were designed for "fast" ditch spanning, it still took a good 2 hours to deploy it, and that's not within the SPWaW time-frame.

At least engineers are able to clear a 50m wide minefield in 10 minutes! [;)]

[Losqualo]

In SPWAW...

[chief]

That's because in SPwaw we have millions of pixel sized engineers working their little pixelated tails off.[:D][;)][8D]

[robot]

I have no idea how you all figure the time line in Spwaw. but here is how i do it for myself. I figure each turn is 5 minutes. So if i have a 36 turn battle in the long campaign which goes all the way to 36 turns to complete. Then i have been fighting for 3 hours. Way more then enough time to throw a baily bridge across a small river.

In a hard pitched battle trying to go say 2000 yards thru swarms of men and tanks to the rear VHs. Well that seems to me it takes more then 15 minutes even at the best of times.

This is one mans opinion only and not nessearely the views of the manufacturs.[:D][:D][:D]

[pappasmurf]

Your time frame dosn't work. A tank crew is capable of firing a round every 7 seconds on average. even with slower traverse times for some tanks taking this to say 15 seconds a shot you ar elooking at 4/8.5- shots a minute. SPWaW tunrs would seem to be 30 second turns based on ROF. based on Movement (I used the M-24 chaffee 56kph top speed) the tunrs work out to 1 minute, 32hexes max speed road x30m= 960M per turn max 960x60 if 60 is seconds in a turn= 57,600M per hour (57.6 KPH. This is close enough to the listed top speed I used http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/m24.htm that it shows a 1 minute turn leangth.

Since movment is the most important part of the game engine. I favor this as the time setting for the turn. ROF is effectively halved for tanks in SPWaW but oh well so be it.

This a 36 turn game is just over half an hour.

[robot]

That may be Pappa. But it some times takes me to move and fire 200 units over an hour. Put in there return fire and movement. Also add the off board time to fire and be resolved. So i just took five minutes per turn as a natural progression in time for my battles. I just hate to put in my AAR that the battle started and stopped on what the game says in time. If the battle says it started at 2000 hours and you look again after say 32 turns it still says 2000 hours. Seems to me a progression in time here seems better for my peace of mind.

[Losqualo]

IIRC, originally one turn was 5 minutes. But over the time it went more towards 2 or 3 minutes. For the Depot OOB's we plan with a 2 minute turn at the moment.

[Riun T]

I don't really have an assessed time,thou the two-three min. turn makes scense to me by way of the speeds that everything travels/hex. {a tank doesn't take no 5 min. to go 50m.}and the comment about engineers takeing 10min. to clear a 50m. minefield isn't unrealistic when u figure a squad of 10 or 12 and I think the Japanese had a 14 man engineer squad,is pretty specialized in what they can do in a 1/2 a footballfields worth of realestate,depending on whats shooting at them,and the topography,that many specialists in that small an area can do great things.also the aspect of turning off the fast arty shows the time frame to be much more realistic. RT

[pappasmurf]

Engineers can clear a 30M quite quickly. The idea is not to remove all the mines but create a marked safe lane of travel Rough two paths spaced apart equal to the width of the primary viehicles following the engineers.

[Hunpecked]

ORIGINAL: pappasmurf

Your time frame dosn't work. A tank crew is capable of firing a round every 7 seconds on average. even with slower traverse times for some tanks taking this to say 15 seconds a shot you ar elooking at 4/8.5- shots a minute.

I've always rationalized the discrepancy by assuming that a tank in SPWAW is seldom able to fire at max rate for an entire turn, perhaps because the target(s) is temporarily obscured by smoke or moving in and out of obstructing terrain, the crew is distracted by false targets, or the tank is jockeying for better position (even if it doesn't "move" in SPWAW terms). Even in a "target-rich environment" a crew might fire at maximum rate only for a fraction of a turn. On the other hand, using SPWAW's "special" op fire, a crew may fire at its theoretical maximum rate when under heavy attack.

As for mines, I regard a single-density mine hex as a "hasty" minefield consistent with SPWAW's intent to portray mobile engagements. Mine density and concealment are minimal, so engineers can clear a lane with relative ease. Denser minefields (double or triple density) don't necessarily represent more mines in RL, but do reflect greater time and effort in minelaying.

[RockinHarry]

ORIGINAL: pappasmurf

Your time frame dosn't work. A tank crew is capable of firing a round every 7 seconds on average. even with slower traverse times for some tanks taking this to say 15 seconds a shot you ar elooking at 4/8.5- shots a minute. SPWaW tunrs would seem to be 30 second turns based on ROF. based on Movement (I used the M-24 chaffee 56kph top speed) the tunrs work out to 1 minute, 32hexes max speed road x30m= 960M per turn max 960x60 if 60 is seconds in a turn= 57,600M per hour (57.6 KPH. This is close enough to the listed top speed I used http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/m24.htm that it shows a 1 minute turn leangth.

Since movment is the most important part of the game engine. I favor this as the time setting for the turn. ROF is effectively halved for tanks in SPWaW but oh well so be it.

This a 36 turn game is just over half an hour.

Time scale in SPWAW is couple of minutes. That effectively means between 2 and 5 minutes. What you need to take into consideration is that a whole SPWAW game turn is made of 2 player (half) turns! Movement rates and ROF is based on this fact! So if you think a unit or gun has too little ROF, you forgot to count those OP fire opportunities in the enemy players (half) game turn! Also what about movement allowances, when units retreat/rout in the enemy (half) game turns retreat phase? Same thing.

Also a game turn includes everything from moving (incl. automatic retreating!), shooting, loading, giving orders, scouting for the enemy ect., so how would you achieve a real world speed and ROF in an IGO-UGO game system?

Recommended reading: game manual page 63 (Opportunity Fire).[;)]

Thanks

[RockinHarry]

ORIGINAL: Losqualo

IIRC, originally one turn was 5 minutes. But over the time it went more towards 2 or 3 minutes. For the Depot OOB's we plan with a 2 minute turn at the moment.

so in fact you´re aiming for 1 minute player half turns? You know what you´re talking about, don´t you?[;)]

http://www.spwaw.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.p ... &&start=25

[RockinHarry]

ORIGINAL: Flyboy

This is probably a flight of fantasy, but have the developers ever considered adding bridging equipment to SPWAW/SPMBT?

I'm picturing a "bridge layer" truck that could be parked on the bank of a narrow river (say, 100 yards/2 hexes max), and if left unsurpressed and unmoved for a number of turns (maybe two turns per hex to be bridged, which could be sped up by the presence of engineers) would lay down a temporary bridge . . . ?

Thoughts?

At first look, bridging equipment would be interesting to implement into SPWAW (or SP2WW2), but actually there´s not really any terrain in SPWAW worth to bridge with regard to hex scale (of 50yds/45m)! In order for bridging equipment to work there´s first the need of having available impassable terrain types like AT ditches or small but deep gullies/streams. These aren´t available in SPWAW. These then would be the proper job for the AVREs. "Bridging" of these small but impassable (to vehicles) obstacles can be better simulated by putting some dragon teeth into stream or trench hexes and then move some AVRE (or any sort of dozer/bridge layer) next to them. Larger impassable terrain types like (deep) rivers already require the presence of whole bridging engineer companies which surely is out of the current SPWAW time scale. "Creative" usage of barges is also thinkable. A one hex deep river actually is 3 hexes wide since 2 shallow water hexes are added automatically which makes the whole river 150 yds wide! A one hex river can only be of the shallow water type and you don´t really need a bridge here, since this terrain type is "easy going" for all kind of units. Scenario makers again can use AT obstacles to make things more realistic. I assume the Camo Workshop guys made similar considerations when not yet adding "arks" and "bridge layers" to their SP2WW2 game!? The classes are there, they´re just not implemented! I´m quite sure this has been discussed already in the camo groups message board. Does anybody know?[&:]

Another hex scale issue in SPWAW would be to add reverse gear to vehicles. I´m not a tanker, I never was, but from my experience playing tank sims like Panzer Elite, IPanzer44 or Panzer Commander I can say that "reversing" mostly takes place within the 10 to 20 meter range, while hiding behind some house, trees, a terrain folding or crest line. In SPWAW you either move 50 yds or not at all. Not much realistic IMHO. I think placing some smoke screen and then turn around and run was the more common practice. AFAI can tell, Combat Leader deals with "reversing" at the small 15m hex scale![:)]

[historyis]

The only bridging that immediately comes to mind is that scene in "A Bridge Too Far" when the Americans/British have to build a Bailey Bridge of the Zon River... and that took all night.